This invention pertains to construction and more particularly to expansion of existing houses and the like.
Many houses constructed during the post-World War II housing boom are single story dwellings. While the ‘ranch style’ house was popular then, now, with the price of land at a premium and consumers desiring larger, more spacious houses, multi-story dwellings are becoming the standard. Multi-story houses benefit not only the inhabitants but owners as well. The additional stories increase the size and the value of the house commensurately.
Financially it often is impractical to buy an existing single story house, demolish it and rebuild a new multi-story dwelling; rather, it would be ideal if the existing structure could be modified to increase its size. If the land size is large enough, it would be a simple matter to just build the house out farther but, many times, the house is already at a maximum size allowed per regulated footprint and setbacks for the land on which it resides.
Therefore, the only way to keep the existing structure and increase the size of the dwelling is to add additional levels. Converting a single story structure to a two-story effectively doubles the size of the living space and markedly increases the value of the structure. Traditionally, the addition of levels to an existing structure is an expensive and time consuming process that often yields minimum returns on investment. A new system and method for adding levels to an existing structure at a minimal cost and time would be most beneficial.
Currently, the process of adding an additional level to an existing structure requires the complete removal and destruction of the roof. The roof must be removed to allow the new level to be constructed and to allow access for the reinforcement of the existing structure. Reinforcement of the existing structure must often be done since the initial construction was not done in a manner to support the non-existent additional level(s). Once reinforced, the additional level(s) could be constructed on top of the existing structure. Finally, a new roof structure can be formed to complete the remodeling process. The removal and reconstruction of the roof structure adds additional time and cost to the process of adding the new level(s).
The invention enables a method for raising a structure with a jacking system for installation of a building element, which comprises one or more of vertical jack assemblies and a system to control the rate at which the structure can be elevated by the jack assemblies independently of each other jack assembly.
An object of this invention is to reduce the time and cost associated with the addition of new level(s) to an existing structure. The invention preserves the existing roof structure, creates a new system to rapidly construct the new level on the existing structure and utilizes pre-manufactured components to further decrease the cost and improve efficiency.